


When the World Falls Away

by Isra



Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: Blood, Injury, M/M, Peril, Physical Trauma, earthquake, small spaces
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-26
Updated: 2015-01-31
Packaged: 2018-03-09 18:49:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3260564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isra/pseuds/Isra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While filming a special episode of GMM, Rhett and Link fall victim to a disaster and have only each other to depend on.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

—Rhett—

“Ready for this, Link?”

The shorter man stared up at the small camera in Rhett’s hand, meeting the taller man’s gaze through the viewfinder. His eyes were wide and his jaw tense; he hugged his puffy blue vest to himself, looking cold despite the long-sleeved black shirt he wore underneath. As usual, Rhett had a hard time determining how much of the man’s distress was genuine versus played up for the audience. “I don’t know, man,” Link quavered. “Are we sure it’s safe?”

Rhett swiveled the view to pan over the building they stood in front of, taking in the flaky once-white paint and boarded-up windows before lingering on the partially collapsed roof over the attic above the second floor. The afternoon sun illuminated the shot dramatically, sending long shadows across the overgrown front lawn. As he tried to properly capture the looming menace of the place, he spoke into the mic. “Other folks have been here recently. We saw the videos; they got in and out fine. We know it’s safe… well, probably.”

He focused on the immense set of wooden doors in front of them, showing one ajar with only darkness visible beyond the crack. He turned the camera to face himself and waggled his eyebrows at it in an attempt to heighten the drama despite being entirely confident in the abandoned mansion’s structural integrity. “We drove all the way out here. We can’t stop now, Link! We’re on an adventure together. We gotta keep going. Do it for the Mythical Beasts.”

They’d spent some time exploring the grounds, picking their way through the overgrown gardens and trying to decipher the inscriptions on the small headstones in the family burial plot out back, but now Rhett was eager to finally enter the place. He filmed Link as the brunet moved closer to the camera and adjusted his glasses, blinking his deep-set blue eyes. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll do it for you, Mythical Beasts.”

Rhett was careful to hold the camera steady as he shook his head in amusement. His friend’s big doe eyes always played well with the viewers, especially when the man was being emotional. “It’ll be just like when we were kids explorin’ those shacks back home,” Rhett assured him. “Nothin’ bad ever happened then, right?”

Link smiled. “Well, there might’ve been psychological trauma from some of that graffiti…”

Rhett chuckled. “Hopefully no one’s been giving anatomy lessons on the walls in this one. We’d have to edit that out.”

The smaller man raised his chin to survey the building in front of them, and rather than follow his gaze with the camera to show what Link was looking at, Rhett zoomed in on his friend’s profile. The sun burnished the planes of his cheeks and shone on his glossy raven locks; his slightly parted lips gave his expression a cast of childlike wonder. _Beautiful_ , Rhett thought, then paused and furrowed his brow. _I mean… the viewers’ll love this shot._

“Ready?” Rhett asked gruffly.

Link peered into the camera as he pressed his lips together and gulped audibly. “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

“You can do it, Serpent King,” the larger man muttered as he passed the camera to his friend. He rubbed his palms together in anticipation before he put his shoulder to the door. It swung open with a loud creak, dust cascading from the lintel into the late day sun. The smell of old paper and kerosene and rotting food wafted over them and Link immediately coughed, then smiled sheepishly when Rhett turned.

“Keep it together, brother,” the blond admonished with a grin. His heart raced in anticipation as he pulled a small flashlight from his pocket, flicked it on, and stepped into the darkness.

*

*

—Link—

He turned on the camera’s light before reaching out his free hand to place his fingertips lightly on Rhett’s lower back.  The feel of the thick cotton of the tall man’s burgundy sweatshirt and the warmth of the body underneath calmed him. He maintained the contact as he followed his friend into the house but didn’t let the camera see that he was holding on. Even though he was willing to let Rhett take the lead, he could only read so many YouTube comments about “the short guy” being a coward before they started to grate. He was determined to put on a brave performance now that they’d gotten down to business.

Rhett’s flashlight played over the scuffed and cracked floorboards before moving up the peeling wallpaper on the walls, taking in the dingy, faded floral pattern. Despite it being daytime, the plywood over the first floor windows kept out most of the light and their eyes had to adjust after the brightness outside. Rhett’s voice bounced strangely around the high ceilings and along the second-floor landing. “Yep, here’s the entryway, just like in the video.”

“It smells pretty bad,” Link observed.

“I guess half of that is assorted bits of the building itself givin’ off a stench, and half is from folks squatting here and not cleaning up after themselves,” Rhett explained to the camera.

“Yeah, it’s definitely a combo of oldness, spoiled food, and bodily fluids. Eugh.”

Link pressed his sleeve to his nose as he eyed the warped double-wide stairs in front of them dubiously, taking in their bowed bannister and missing steps. This formerly majestic center staircase had been deemed unsafe by previous explorers, but the far end of the building supposedly contained a set of servants’ stairs. “Let’s explore the first floor first, huh?” he suggested.

The tall man tossed another charming grin into the lens. “Good idea. We’ll save the second floor for when it’s really dark out.”

Link rolled his eyes as they moved together further into the building’s interior. He began narrating their exploration, reminding the audience of the facts they planned to include in the introduction to the footage. “Now remember, this place has been abandoned since the seventies, when there was that triple murder. No one has wanted to move in since then.”

“Because it’s haunted,” Rhett called over his shoulder. “People have reported seeing ghosts in the rooms where the folks died.”

They poked around a dining room that still had a heavy oak table and set of ornate chairs around it, some laying down on the floor, all their fabric cushions rotted away. Someone had smashed all the bulbs in the chandelier overhead and there were shards of glass on the table’s dark veneer. Link hugged his arms around himself as he murmured, “Do we know which rooms? That they died in?”

He heard the smile on his friend’s face when the man chirped, “Nope!”

Link sighed and picked at a hanging strip of wallpaper, feeling a hint of satisfaction when it peeled off in one large piece. He let it fall to the floor and reached for the next before he stopped himself.  As much as he would enjoy stripping the walls inch by inch, the viewers probably wanted something a bit more lively.

That was the whole reason they were there, really. To try something different; to push the boundaries for Season 7. They were both feeling the pressure of their precipitous jump in subscribers and wanted to make sure they didn’t slack off and lose their momentum. Each episode had to be bigger and better than the last. More extreme. It wasn’t enough, anymore, to sit at the desk and talk about a documentary they watched or what they did over the weekend. They had to make it awesome.

So when one of their interns stumbled on this video of some teenagers exploring an abandoned house only a few hours’ drive away, it seemed like an inexpensive idea for an adventure (even after their agent negotiated with the bank that owned the property for permission to film on it so they wouldn’t be trespassing). It was only after they’d added it to the production schedule that Rhett suggested they heighten the “spooky” factor by filming at sundown and by doing it vlog-style, just the two of them. The crew would stay home, and he and Link would spend the afternoon and evening collecting entertaining footage of their exploration. With any luck they’d get enough to fill multiple videos or maybe do a special of some kind.

Link watched his best friend moving into the darkness ahead of him as the shadows tilted and loomed overhead. He suppressed a shudder at the way the floor creaked with each of their steps and told himself to get a grip. Man up.

_I’m with Rhett. We’re on an adventure. What’s the worst that could happen?_


	2. Chapter 2

—Rhett—

It had taken him a while to convince Link to go along with his plan of filming this excursion without the crew. Since hiring a full production team, they didn’t really film anything on their own anymore. These days they used multiple cameras to catch the best moments and someone on staff edited them together after the fact. It meant they didn’t have to think as hard about how to set up a single shot and things generally went faster, not to mention giving their videos a more “professional” look.

But it had the unintended result of making them seem somewhat impersonal. Passing a camera back and forth or squeezing together into one shot had made things feel immediate and important. For years, it had been just him and Link working hard to get it right the first time. He worried some of the viewers were missing that closeness, so he’d pushed for it this time. It wasn’t as if he, Rhett, were missing that sense of intimacy from filming alone with Link… right?

As he turned with another broad grin to take the camera from his friend, the faint frisson generated by the brushing of their fingertips belied Rhett’s internal claims. Of course he missed it. He always wanted more time with Link than he got. The only thing that made the longing sting less was the vague sense that the other man felt the same way. But they’d be fools to complain about their success; the relatively small cost it meant to their friendship paled in comparison to the innumerable opportunities that came from being at the top of the YouTube charts. He did his best to enjoy what they had and be grateful for it.

“Why don’t you go ahead of me into the kitchen, brother?” Rhett suggested.

“You think there’s gonna be something gross in there for me to step in first, is that it?” Link laughed.

“Better you than me!” He gave the man’s shoulder a playful nudge.

Link took the flashlight and held his breath as he stepped onto the slick tiles, but the yellow beam didn’t illuminate anything immediately offensive. The younger man yelped in surprise when a shadow skittered by at the edge of the light — a rat, Rhett guessed. He started laughing but swallowed it down into a cough when his friend turned and glared. “Sorry,” Rhett apologized. In truth, he’d been just as startled, he just wasn’t the type to yell about it. Link always put on a better show for the viewers in that regard.

There were rotting remnants of a meal in the long-dry sink from the last explorers to come through, which Rhett poked with a stick as Link played up his gagging reaction for comedic value. “I’m surprised there isn’t a family of raccoons livin’ in here,” the brunet muttered.

“Maybe they’re on the second floor,” Rhett laughed.

“Oh gee, I can’t wait.” Link rolled his dilated eyes at the camera. “Maybe you can make friends with ‘em, Rhett.”

They moved systematically through the first floor, taking some effort to navigate the old architecture of curved hallways and strangely shaped rooms. Some doorways were blocked and they had to find a way around, doubling back or climbing through openings that previous explorers had knocked directly through walls. Rhett’s sense of direction wasn’t great at the best of times and the twists and turns in the semidarkness eventually had him rather confused. Still, whenever he would pause and cast about for the best way forward, he felt Link’s fingertips grasp the back of his shirt and it made him smile.

They didn’t encounter anything truly terrifying, though Rhett tried his best to maintain the suspense anyway, pausing every now and then to direct some excited feelings at the camera. Link appeared more nervous about their safety than anything supernatural, though he seemed entirely content to let Rhett keep the lead.

Maybe because of the way the plants had grown up over the exterior of the house, it hadn’t seemed this big from the outside. After the second time Rhett opened what he thought was a closet door only to find another whole room beyond it, he laughed. “You know, Link, I’ve been thinkin’ about gettin’ a larger house. I bet this one’s pretty cheap. Both our families could fit in here easy — we could each have our own wing! You in?”

He felt Link’s eyes on him for the split second it always took for the man to make sure his friend was joking before he played along. “Go for it, man! We’ll move in after you’ve done the renovations.”

He clapped Link’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze as he chuckled. He hadn’t been serious, of course, but the idea of living with his friend again now that they were grown men with families was strangely appealing. He shook his head, reminding himself of their different parenting styles and conflicting ideas of how neat a living space should be. _We’d probably murder each other_ , he had to admit.

Eventually they concluded they’d seen everything on the first floor and found their way to the narrow hallway that ended in the servants’ stairs. Rhett shone his flashlight up the steep incline to the forbidding darkness of the second floor. “What do you think, Link?”

“I think we’ve seen enough of this place.”

Rhett swung around to face him and the smaller man flinched away from the bright beam of light. “C’mon, man,” the blond cajoled. “There might be treasures up there! Untold discoveries!”

Link’s mouth quirked. “Or there could be more broken furniture and rat droppings.”

“That’s probably more likely,” Rhett acknowledged. “But we can’t stop now!” He didn’t wait for an answer before testing the first step. It was warped and slightly squishy, but it otherwise felt solid underneath. He braced his hand on the wall and took a deep breath before putting his full weight on the stair. Much to his relief, his foot did go through it. He took a second step, then a third, and Link’s hand skimmed over the hem of his sweatshirt as they both made their way up the stairs.

*

*

—Link—

“This is starting to get stupid,” Link muttered to himself. Why risk falling through the ceiling if they didn’t have to? The videos of this place claimed the second floor was safe, but who knew if they’d tested it with anyone Rhett’s size? He chewed the inside of his cheek and kept his reservations to himself.

Fortunately there seemed to be less water damage on the second floor and less debris too. Most of the people who had used the place as temporary shelter over the years must have stayed on the first floor and kept their garbage with them. On the other hand, that meant there was little of interest for them to film as they moved from room to room. To fill the time, they reminisced further about the abandoned buildings they’d explored as children. They both wracked their brains for stories they hadn’t already told the viewers, embellishing as necessary to keep it interesting, at times almost turning it into an improv game.

As the sun finished setting and the house got darker, he stayed close to Rhett whenever they stopped moving. He began to shiver on occasion and it wasn’t put on for the audience; he was actually getting quite cold. It was hard to resist the urge to slip his arm under the larger man’s hoodie and snuggle into his side for warmth. _Maybe when we’re done filming_ , Link told himself.

They were in what had once been a bedroom at the far end of the house on the second floor. The room was octagonal and its ceiling rose into a dome high overhead. There was a large window with its glass still intact looking out over the back garden and Link stepped up to it and tried to film a bit of the moonlit landscape. After a moment he felt Rhett move behind him and the man’s hand came down gently onto his shoulder, giving it a little squeeze before resting there.

The warmth of it made Link smile and he resisted the strange urge to rub his cheek against it like a cat. He had a thought that most friends do not hang out alone in dark bedrooms with a cameras. But then again, they’d never been like most friends.

They stood in companionable silence for a few minutes and Link began to feel just how far they were from the rest of the world. Compared to the bustle of Burbank, this quiet room might as well be on a different planet. Without thinking about it, he shifted slightly until his back was against Rhett’s torso. The taller man moved his hand down from Link’s shoulder to encircle his waist with his arm. He could tell Rhett was holding him with a deliberate looseness, staying above the quilted barrier of Link’s vest. They were comfortable enough to share warmth, but they were also careful not to press too close, because that risked raising a question neither was willing to ask… let alone answer.

Rhett’s breath puffed through his hair. The larger man’s fingers skimmed mindlessly over the smooth fabric as if unconsciously seeking… what? He was not usually a fidgeter. Link firmly ignored it and drew his mind back to the immediate issue of the video. He figured they must have seen pretty much the whole building by now, and probably had enough footage of their reactions combined with tales of childhood mishaps to edit together into something decent. Best to wrap things up before Rhett decided to get “creative” with the ghost story angle.

He had just opened his mouth to suggest they call it a night when a strange sensation stopped the words in his throat. It felt like a rhythmic vertigo, a subtle sensation of movement that was causing his sense of balance to go haywire. For a moment he thought it was coming from his own shivering legs, but his brain insisted that was not the case.

He felt the hand fall from his waist as he turned to face his friend. He saw in the light of the camera that Rhett’s eyes were wide mirrors of his own confusion. “What —?” the larger man asked.

Link braced his hand on the rough wall beside the window as his dizziness increased. “You feel that too?”

The floor suddenly pitched, causing Rhett to take a stumbling step toward him and catch his own hand on the wall next to Link’s head. There was a loud creak followed by a splintering of wood somewhere below them. They reached the same realization in an instant and gaped at each other, frozen in terror.

Rhett was the first to snap into action. “Earthquake!” he shouted. “Get out, we have to get out!”

He snatched Link’s arm and turned, covering the distance to the door in three long strides and pulling the paralyzed man along with him. Link was faint with fear as he struggled to make his legs move, to keep up so he wouldn’t be dead weight slowing his friend down. Together they careened down the hallway, through another bedroom and a large sitting room to the narrow steps they’d come up. They ran down them two at a time as the light from Rhett’s flashlight and the camera dangling from Link’s wrist bouncing crazily off the walls.

At the bottom, Rhett forged ahead into the darkness of the first floor with his grip still tight on Link’s forearm. Around them, the groans of the building were getting louder, as if it were tearing itself apart. Somewhere in the chaos, Link’s racing mind wondered just how long an earthquake could last. _Isn’t it just a few seconds?_ But it seemed to be getting worse rather than subsiding. The floor heaved beneath him like a ship in a storm and he tripped, slamming down onto his knees with a cry. He was back up in an instant, hauled up by his wrist like a toddler having a tantrum in a supermarket.

“C’mon!” Rhett pulled Link around a pile of broken furniture and through a couple of doors before skidding to a halt in the kitchen. He passed the flashlight rapidly over the walls to confirm what they had already discovered earlier that day — there was no way out of the room but the way they’d come in. The larger man swore and yanked Link back out to the turn he’d missed in his panic.

There was a louder noise of groaning wood and Link thought he saw one of the outer walls leaning in toward them. “Rhett!” he cried out. They weren’t going to make it. He started to pray.

They ran headlong into the dining room and Rhett slammed blindly into the heavy table, catching most of it with his free hand but still doubled over by the force of it. He straightened up and there was a brief moment when Link saw his face in the beam of the flashlight, and it was twisted with fear and panic unlike anything he had seen before. Then the man met Link’s eyes and seemed to regain his determination.

“We can’t make it out. This table’s probably the strongest thing here.”

Link stared at him, speechless. Rhett jerked his arm, turned him, pushed him down to his knees. “Get under it, hurry!”

Link did as directed and crawled forward into the darkness. He hunched over his knees with his hands on his head like a kid in a 1950’s air raid drill, shaking and gasping with sobs of panic. He felt Rhett crawl in after him, _over_ him, knees against the smaller man’s backside and chest pressed into his back. The flashlight on the ground beside them illuminated Rhett’s hands braced to either side of Link’s head. They stayed like that while reality swayed around them, feeling the floor buck and writhe and listening to the groans of the building being wrenched in all directions.

After some indeterminate time, the noise quieted and the movements around them seemed to slow. The larger man’s quick breaths stirred the hair at the nape of Link’s neck. The solid warmth of him took the sharp edge off of Link’s fear, though his heart still pounded impossibly fast. Eventually Link felt Rhett’s weight lift from him slightly, though he didn’t otherwise move away, still holding himself over the smaller man.

Link stirred and lifted his head. _We didn’t die._ The adrenaline coursing through him made him feel nauseated and weak. He shifted and rolled onto his side within the confines of Rhett’s limbs. He peered up and saw the other man gazing down at him in the amber light of the flashlight, his eyes wide and dark and very close.

“Why’d we move to California again?” Link mumbled.

Rhett let out a sharp bark of laughter, apparently sharing his friend’s desire to conceal how shaken up he was. “Good question. I hope we got all that on tape.”

He shifted further to give Link more space in preparation for backing out from under the table, and the smaller man felt a strange wistfulness. _No, don’t go._ He rolled onto his back and stretched out his legs alongside Rhett’s knees. _Maybe we could stay here and relax for a little bit_ , he thought. _Maybe we could…_

He was about to come up with some lame excuse to keep Rhett from leaving when he heard a deep rumbling, rushing noise. It bellowed like a monster charging ever closer and the two men stared at each other in renewed alarm. _Aftershocks already? Something else?_

Neither had a chance to say anything before there was a deafening crash. It came from all around them in a concussion wave that drove the air from Link’s lungs. The last thing he saw before he flung his arm in front of his face was Rhett locking his elbows and arching himself above him like a human shield. Then darkness slammed into him with a close and terrible crunch of oak, seizing him in agony for only an instant before everything went even darker than that.


	3. Chapter 3

—Rhett—

He struggled to consciousness in fits and starts. At first the pain was so great that his mind fled from it, heedless of the tiny part of him that demanded he wake up, and he sank back under again. Finally, he became more aware of himself and of the fact that he was still alive. He opened his eyes to darkness so deep he kept blinking and staring, unable to tell if his sight was working. His nose was mostly clogged and he found himself breathing shallowly through his mouth, as if his ribcage and diaphragm knew better than to expand fully. There was a deep burning pain in his back and his mouth tasted like metal. Below his waist there was no sensation at all.

Without his vision, it took him some time to orient himself in space. He eventually determined that he was lying face down with his right arm above his head and his left arm down alongside his body. He wasn’t on a floor or other flat surface, though. There was something large and irregular underneath him, something warm, flesh with bone underneath. There was hair in front of his face that carried a familiar scent. Link.

Rhett groaned and coughed, then hissed through his teeth at the fresh pain that shot through his chest. Something was broken, perhaps many things. He knew he’d have to deal with that at some point, but there was something more important right now. “Link,” he rasped, struggling to force the word through lips that felt fat and slow. “Link,” he repeated, louder.

The man lying face-up below him didn’t move. Rhett’s exhausted heart managed a few beats of panic as he groped for his friend’s neck, scraping his fingers over the sharp adam’s apple and pressing them into the curve underneath it. He held his breath and prayed until he felt a faint twitch, then another. “Oh, thank God,” he whispered as tears sprang to his eyes. He turned his face into Link’s neck, straining for any further information he could glean from the pitch darkness. He ran his hand over the man’s hair and face to feel for injuries or other clues. There was no stickiness of blood; the bones seemed intact, though Link’s glasses were gone. His lips were parted and Rhett felt the warmth of his breath on his fingertips.

Rhett flexed his left hand where it lay against his hip; it seemed relatively uninjured but trapped by the position he was in. He tried to ignore the lack of sensation in his lower half; it was surely a temporary condition, a pinched nerve or something. Besides, wasn’t it better than pain? He tried to use his free arm to move off of Link but only managed to lift himself a few painful inches before his shoulders struck something rough and angled above him. The underside of the table, he guessed. It seemed the side of it that had been above their legs had collapsed, and that — along with whatever was on top of it — was what was now pinning Rhett’s body down at the waist. The half of the table over their heads was still standing, providing this small pocket of space and air. Rhett paused to thank God for it. They could still get out of here alive.

Rhett tried to pull himself forward with his free arm, but he was hampered by the pain in his chest and the fact that there was nothing to get a good grip on aside from Link. He didn't want to hurt the man any more than he might already be. He tried wriggling backward, but without the aid of his legs that was a hopeless endeavor. He didn't even have any side to side movement; he guessed his left leg was entirely caught under something. It was a small miracle that what was pinning his lower body wasn't also putting its weight on Link; the mass above him was sufficiently to the side that it was only his own body weighing down the smaller man.

_He's gonna tease me about how I need to lose weight when he wakes up,_ Rhett thought.

_Please wake up._

Rhett remembered the cellphone in his back pocket. He tried to maneuver his free arm around to it, but he couldn’t get his elbow past some large immovable object to their side.  As he struggled to shift his position, grunting with the effort, he started to truly feel the confines of the space crowding in around him. He had never considered himself claustrophobic, but only a fool would not be discomfited by the thought of thousands of pounds hanging inches over his head in the darkness. He realized he was sweating even though he felt cold.

He pressed his ear to Link’s chest to reassure himself of the man’s heartbeat once more, clinging to the faint beat of it. He was tired. Perhaps he should close his eyes, since it didn’t seem to matter whether they were open or not. Perhaps he should let himself rest.

*

*

—Link—

He dreamed he was back in the sensory deprivation tank. For a while he floated with no sense of his own body or of the world outside, just peace and silence and warmth. But then there came a throbbing pain in his head, a deep dull ache that pulsed with his heartbeat. He wasn’t floating; he was pinned under a heavy weight, which he struggled against like a lunatic in a straightjacket. Why couldn’t he move?

He opened his eyes with a gasp, but he saw nothing. Both his arms were bent above his head and he brought them down to feel his face. His glasses were gone, which compounded his sense of helplessness despite the knowledge he wouldn’t see anything even if he had them. He rubbed his eyes and blinked, slowly turning his head from side to side and wincing at how the motion increased the pain in his head. He labored to breathe under the weight on his chest.

There was warm air moving over his throat. He moved his hands lower and felt a stiff head of hair and the side of a bearded face. That explained the weight. Rhett was lying on top of him with his head on Link’s upper chest, hand curled around the smaller man’s shoulder. The man wasn’t centered on him; his legs alternated with Link’s so that one was to the outside and the other between Link’s two, and his pelvis was similarly canted to the side as it pressed into Link’s thigh. If it weren’t for his headache, the position would be almost comfortable…

Memories of the earthquake came back in flashes. The panicked dash through the house as it swayed like buildings are not supposed to sway. Rhett’s hand wrapped tightly around his wrist. Both of them huddling under the table and praying it would be strong enough to protect them. _Are we still under it? Is that where we are?_

Link stretched out his arms until he found the boundaries of their space, which didn’t take long. There was no sign of the flashlight or the camera. Unidentifiable debris lay close behind his head and to his sides. He felt rough, unfinished wood a few feet above his head that sloped down over Rhett’s back until it met the man’s body just above the waist of his jeans. Link was afraid to push too hard against it in case he caused a further collapse; it was impossible to know what was above them or how precarious it all was.

“Rhett?” he whispered, cringing in anticipation of an avalanche. When there was no response, he stroked the man’s cheek. “Rhett? Please wake up.”

He cupped his friend’s face more firmly, feeling the breath on his palm. The man was alive, why wasn’t he waking up? A tightness spread from Link’s throat down into his chest as he contemplated the small space they were in. There was no knowing how long they’d been there already or how much air they had left. And it was all his fault, because he’d been frozen in fear; he hadn’t run fast enough and he’d kept them both from getting out in time.

He gulped back a sob as he clutched at Rhett’s neck and shoulder. “Please, please wake up. I need you, Rhett, I can’t…”

The weight atop him stirred and groaned. Link’s name rumbled through the darkness. “Hey buddy, it’s okay. I’m here.”

Relief washed over him, but he was still afraid. “Rhett! Oh, thank God. I think we’re trapped. I can’t see.”

“Yeah, me neither. There’s no light.”

“Do you think there’s enough air? Are we gonna…?” Link trailed off, afraid to say it.

“We’ll be okay.” He felt Rhett’s hand in his hair, caressing it back from his forehead, a startlingly intimate gesture in the dark. “There’s a little airflow. Can you feel it?” the larger man asked softly.

Link concentrated in silence for a few seconds. He thought that maybe he did sense some fresh air coming from somewhere above his head. They didn’t seem to be completely sealed up, and his panic lessened somewhat. “Yeah, I think so.”

“Are you hurt?” Rhett asked.

The smaller man shifted around a little as best he could in order to evaluate things. His limbs seemed willing to bend without complaint, at least as far as I could move them while being pinned like he was. “Nothing too serious I don’t think, except I’ve got a heck of a headache.”

Rhett’s free hand petted his hair again and Link closed his eyes, letting the sensation of the caress blunt the pain. “That’s good,” the larger man murmured.

“Do you think we can get ourselves out?” Link asked.

Rhett was quiet for a few seconds before he replied, “Whatever’s on my back is pretty heavy. I haven’t been able to shift it.” He coughed shallowly, then hissed through his teeth.

It occurred to Link that his friend must have borne the large brunt of the impact of the collapsing table as he protected the smaller man with his own body. “How badly are you hurt?” he whispered.

“I’ll be fine,” Rhett answered quickly. “Maybe got some cracked ribs.”

It seemed like the man was holding back, but without visual clues Link couldn’t tell much about his state of mind. Rhett’s fingers were now resting in his hair as the man’s arm curved around his shoulder, his face in the crook of Link’s neck. Despite his headache, Link was starting to feel comfortable. After the initial shock of their predicament waned, he felt like he wasn’t in immediate danger. He absentmindedly nuzzled the top of Rhett’s head and inhaled the scent of his hair gel. There were worse places to be trapped, he thought.

After a moment, Rhett asked, “Can you reach your phone?”

“Oh! Let’s see.” _Why didn’t I think of that?_ Link carefully bent his arm and worked it down alongside their chests until he reached the pocket of his jeans. He pushed his fingers into the tight fabric and grasped the edge of his phone, wiggling it out and bringing it back up to their faces. He held his breath and pushed the power button.

Nothing.

Either it was broken or the battery was dead; there was no way of knowing. “Dangit,” he sighed. “What about yours?”

“Mine’s in my back pocket.”

“Oh.”

They were both silent for a while. Link whispered, “Sorry I slowed us down gettin’ out.”

Rhett’s counter was quick, as if he’d been prepared for Link to blame himself and would have none of it. “Eh, who knows if we could’ve made it regardless. And besides, I’m the one who pushed for us to explore this place.”

“Yeah, but you had no idea that this…” Link trailed off as his throat began to tighten.

Rhett seemed to sense his friend’s rising distress. He stroked his forehead and assured him, “They must know we’re here. The quake sure felt big enough to make the news. Stevie’s probably trying to get in touch with us even now, and when she can’t, she’ll come out here. Or when we don’t come home, Jessie or Christy will call the studio. I’m sure someone’s already on their way. Just stay calm, brother. Worst case, we’ve got a long and boring wait ahead of us.”

Link tried to let himself be reassured. More comforting than Rhett’s words were the weight of his body and the soft tugs of his fingers running slowly through Link’s hair. _We’re in this together._ He rested his own hand on Rhett’s shoulder and grasped it gently. _We have each other._


	4. Chapter 4

—Rhett—

As they lay in silence, each man in his own thoughts, Rhett strove to keep his fear in check. He knew Link was depending on him to keep a clear head. More importantly, he wanted to keep them both calm so they didn’t use up their oxygen any faster than necessary. Despite the reassurances he’d given his friend, Rhett’s confidence was more fragile than he’d let on. Sure, they appeared had a source of fresh air, but there was no knowing how long it would last. They didn’t have any water or food, nor a way of communicating with the outside world. If Stevie didn’t check in with them, or if their wives didn’t notice their extended absence, it could be hours before anyone became concerned, and then at least two more hours for them to drive out to the site.

Those hours promised to be a marathon of pain for Rhett. Link’s shifting around to extract his cellphone had jostled the larger man’s ribs and sent fire along his spine. He had bitten his lip hard to keep from crying out, thankful his friend was too focused on his phone to notice. Rhett’s head was foggy, his skin prickled with alternating waves of heat and cold, and his mouth still tasted of coppery blood. He had no idea what was going on below his waist and he tried his best not to think about it.

The only part of him that felt good was the shoulder where Link’s hand rested, so Rhett focused on that. He took slow breaths of the man’s clean scent as he twined his fingers through Link’s thick, soft hair.

As a general rule, Link sought physical comfort when distressed; it was one of the ways they differed. Rhett preferred to curl in on himself, detaching from his body entirely, striving for a meditative state where the pain merely fueled his determination to survive. In contrast, Link would reach out for a hug or a clasped hand, leaning into another person's arms as he unabashedly cried out his anguish. Some people thought that meant Link was the weaker of the two, but Rhett knew the truth: it takes strength to be vulnerable.

Even in this state, Rhett wasn't strong enough to admit how much he needed Link now. If he could have pulled away from the other man he surely would have, retreating to a dark corner to lick his wounds alone. But because he didn't have that option — the earth itself was making that impossible — he gradually allowed himself to be comforted. In any other situation it would have been awkward to be pressed into his best friend like this, for a whole lifetime of reasons.

Despite the closeness they’d shared since elementary school, they’d always been careful to maintain a strict brotherly air to their intimacy. If a display of affection seemed too sincere or a gaze lingered too long, the other could be depended on to laugh it off without a second thought. It had become a reflex at this point. They’d never lived together alone; they’d always had a third roommate. Once out of high school they were never both without a girlfriend at the same time. They had both married young with the enthusiastic support of the other.

It was safer that way.  

But here in the darkness, concerns about what was appropriate seemed petty and thin. Rhett knew they cared deeply for each other. He knew they felt this mutual pull toward each other, threads of loyalty and devotion binding them as eternally as marriage vows. Down here, far from the light of day, he felt no qualms in taking what comfort he could from the company of his friend.

If only he could feel what was going on below his waist, it would probably feel quite nice to be up against Link like this. As it was, if he kept as still as possible and didn’t breathe too deeply, the pain retreated enough for him to enjoy lying on the padded nylon atop the man's firm chest. Given his size, Rhett was always the person doing the holding in any cuddling situation, never the person being held. This turnabout was disorienting but nice. If he overlooked the fact that he was trapped and unable to take satisfying breaths, he'd even say he was content.

_Content to be cuddled by Link?_ He wrestled with the vulnerability that came from admitting how much he wanted it. It was too easy to imagine the pain that would arise from desiring something so close at hand and yet impossible to obtain. Neither of them needed that level of angst in their daily lives. _Better to accept what we have, at this point, than wonder about what could have been_ , he silently admonished himself.

And yet, he pressed his face into the curve of Link’s neck. The other man’s cool fingertips stroked the feverish skin of his cheek, causing Rhett’s pain to recede like waves on a distant shore. The mantra of doubt inside his head faded along with it. _I should say something,_ he thought. _I should ask…_ but Link pre-empted his inner turmoil by asking softly.  “How long can a person survive without water?”

He turned his fingers gently in Link’s hair. “It’s not gonna come to that, brother.”

“I know, but… how long? You read about this stuff.”

“Under normal conditions? About three days, maybe more.”

Link’s chest rose and fell under his cheek. “That’s a while.”

“Yeah, but there are stories of people surviving a lot longer.”

“Like what?”

For the next hour or two, Rhett did his best to distract his friend with all of the extreme survival stories he could remember. He often had to pause to catch his breath, coughing gently in a vain attempt to clear the growing feeling of fluid in his lungs. At those times Link would wait for his friend’s distress to subside, then ask a question that sent the discussion going down another avenue of discovery.

As had been the case ever since they were children, time passed quickly during their intent conversation. With no distractions of work or family, their focus on each other was absolute. Each inhalation carried Link’s breath into him. The smaller man’s hands rested on his upper back and wandered through his hair. He could not imagine feeling closer to another person than he did to Link in this moment.

*

*

—Link—

The fading strength in Rhett’s voice concerned him. Usually the man’s smooth baritone was highly dependable; even when he was sick it only got deeper. Link wanted to keep the conversation going because he knew he’d only imagine the worst if they were silent, but the effort of talking seemed to be taking a lot out of the other man. Link’s back hurt from lying in the same position for hours and his head continued to pound with a blunt, insistent pain. He could only imagine how much worse his friend felt.

When their last topic drew to a close, neither man spoke for a few minutes while Link felt the larger man’s chest move subtly against him with his careful breaths. Eventually Link said, “I wonder what time it is.”

Rhett thought for a moment. “It’s so hard to tell. Time flies when you’re trapped under a house with your best friend.” He gave a weak chuckle and Link smiled but couldn’t force out a laugh. “Maybe ten?” Rhett guessed. That would mean about five hours since they’d entered the house. “I’m sure someone’s looking for us by now.”

“Yeah, they must be.”

Link stared up into the blackness above him, straining to see if he could still feel the caress of fresh air. Rhett’s fingertips absently traced the shell of his ear. The smaller man spread his palm over his friend’s shoulder and felt Rhett’s rapid heartbeat against his chest. For a while they were silent, then Link spoke again.

“What if they aren’t?”

There was an edge of impatience to Rhett’s voice. “They are. Don’t be negative.”

“No, I mean, what if…” Link licked his lips. He hated to say it, but once it was in his head it had to get out. “What if that was the big one, Rhett?” The other man didn’t respond, so Link continued. “What if what we felt here wasn’t even the worst of it? What if there was this huge earthquake in the valley, and they’re not looking for us because… because they can’t?” His voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. “What if they’re already gone?”

He felt Rhett’s forearm tense as the man’s hand clenched into a fist just over Link’s shoulder. “Don’t say that. Don’t ever—“ The man paused to cough. “You gotta stay positive. This place was old and run down. Back home everything’s built to withstand earthquakes. They’re gonna be okay, and they’re gonna come rescue us.”

Link clung to his friend’s words and tried to believe them, but the morbid part of his brain would not stop imagining the worst: the streets of his neighborhood buckled and twisted, huge fissures open in the earth, his home flattened, Christy and the kids…

He sniffled and blinked quickly but could not catch the tear before it escaped the corner of his eye. He didn’t want Rhett to get frustrated with him, but there was no hiding his emotions when the two men were in such close proximity. Chest to chest, Rhett was bound to notice the fact that he was crumbling. He felt a knuckle gently brush his temple, tracing the wet track from the corner of his eye into his hair. “I’m sorry!” Link gasped. “I’m trying to stay calm, I’m doing my best…”

“Shh, it’s okay.” Rhett’s palm fumbled to cup his jaw, fingertips caressing his cheek. “It’s okay to be scared. I’m scared too.” The man coughed again, a wet rasping noise. “Just try not to cry. You need the water.”

The absurd practicality of the statement made Link laugh. He wrapped his arms around Rhett’s shoulders and giggled quietly, knowing he was at the edge of hysteria but not particularly caring. After a moment, he felt more than heard Rhett chuckling softly along with him. When their laughter subsided, a smile lingered on his lips.

He pressed his face into the top of Rhett’s hair. “I’m happy you’re here with me,” he murmured.

“I kinda wouldn’t mind being anywhere else,” the other man answered dryly. “But if I had to be trapped with someone, I’m glad it’s you, buddy.”

Their small pocket of space fell silent again, and Link began to wonder if Rhett had fallen asleep. He himself was wide awake, though, and his mind was wandering down many different garden paths as he lay there in the dark. He was remembering all of the adventures he’d had with Rhett over the years, from when they were kids exploring sewers, egging houses and crashing cars, to when they grew up and did more respectable things like owning a business together, performing on stage for thousands of people, and crashing red carpets. In a way they had already lived more lifetimes than most people twice their age.

But lying there with Rhett so close to him, unable to do anything but breathe in the heady masculine scent of him, Link thought about how there was still one experience they hadn’t shared. One thing Link had always been determined to deny himself until the grave. Well, wasn’t that where they were now? Inside a living tomb?

He ran his fingers through Rhett’s hair and down the back of the man’s neck. He kneaded the hard muscles of his shoulders through his hoodie and traced his nails lightly along where his spine made faint ripples in the cotton. “Rhett,” Link whispered.

There was a delay, then a soft grunt. “Mm?”

“Do you ever think about how things could’ve worked out differently between us?”

The man thought for a moment. “What, like if we’d never become friends?”

“No, I mean… if we hadn’t grown up where we did, when we did… If we hadn’t had to worry about what people thought…”

Rhett stiffly moved to lift up his head. Link felt the man gazing in his direction, and even though he knew he couldn’t see anything through the black, he felt exposed nonetheless. Rhett’s breath puffed over his face. “What’re you saying, Link?”

He cupped Rhett’s cheek, pushing his fingertips into the warm curls of hair at the side of the man’s jaw to keep them from trembling. “I don’t want to die without knowing…”

He trailed off with the expectation that his friend would brush off his words with further insistence that they were in no way going to die, but that didn’t happen. Instead he felt the other man shift forward further, straightening the shoulders that he had curved in order to lie across Link’s chest. “Knowing what?”

Link bit his lip. He didn’t want to ruin what might be their last few hours on earth if he was wrong. But he didn’t want to die with a heart full of regrets, either. “I wish I could see your face,” he whispered.

“I’m smiling, Link. I’m looking at you and I’m smiling.” Rhett’s voice sounded a little stronger. His fingers ran tenderly through Link’s hair.

“In that case…” Link used his hand on the side of the man’s face as a guide as he raised his own head. “I need to know this.” He leaned forward tentatively, not sure exactly how to perform the maneuver blind. He traced his lips along the bearded edge of the man’s jaw before finally locating his mouth. He held himself still for a handful of heartbeats as their breaths mingled and the yearning of decades came crashing down, then they both moved as if with a single will to eliminate the final distance between them. 


	5. Chapter 5

—Rhett—

Link’s lips were soft and dry and they trembled slightly as they pressed into Rhett’s. They were also full and warm and everything Rhett had never left himself dream about, and he leaned into them with a deep noise of longing. He spread his fingers along the nape of his friend’s neck and pulled him close, as close as he could get him in the awkward position they were in. He heard a quiet noise in the man’s throat that echoed his, and together they created a harmony of joy and gratitude between them in the darkness.

Link’s hand moved from his face to around his ear. His fingertips traced down the side of Rhett’s neck, pushing under the collar of his hoodie to caress the bare skin at the top of the larger man’s shoulder. The touch was electrifying and Rhett’s heart leapt painfully in a chest that felt too small to contain it. He parted his lips to let out a soft groan and Link took invitation, sending his tongue to brush the tip of Rhett’s as he tried to pull him closer still.

It had been so long since Link had eaten or drank anything that the taste of his mouth was concentrated into a pure and heady flavor. Rhett felt dizzy as the warmth of desire diffused through his torso. It felt right, and it felt more than right. It felt necessary. How had they lived without this for so long? They had both been too afraid to open the door, to fully face what the world had offered them, insisting they were content as friends, business partners, blood brothers. But there had always been one more layer to go. One more step to take.

In the darkness, they took the step together. They kissed with fierce intensity borne from years of self-denial, of the almosts and not-quites and what-ifs that had followed them throughout their lives. The perfection of the way they fit together into the kiss told them everything they needed to know.

Rhett lost himself in the sensations of his best friend’s embrace until the giddiness of it began to ebb and the pain in his body clawed its way back to the forefront of his consciousness. Link’s hands grasping at his back were getting dangerously close to the injured parts of him that threatened agony if disturbed. He reluctantly pulled away and dropped his head to Link’s chest, panting with emotion and the effort of suppressing a moan of pain. He felt a cold sweat spring up on his forehead as Link lay back and grasped for his hand.

“You okay?” Link asked.

“Yeah, I just need to catch my breath.” Rhett let out a weak chuckle. “Sorry, if I didn’t have a house on my back I’d be doing that for hours, trust me.”

Link’s lips brushed his forehead. “I won’t take it personally,” he promised.

Their fingers twined together on top of the nylon vest. “Now I wish I could see you,” Rhett murmured.

“I’m smiling.”

“Are you doing the thing with your tongue?” Rhett asked.

“What thing?”

“Where you press it against your front teeth and it peeks out just a little.”

Link giggled. “Uh, yeah, I guess I am.”

“You’re so dang cute.” He squeezed the smaller man’s hand, marveling at how comfortable it felt in his own. Link laughed again as he squeezed back. His other hand rested between Rhett’s shoulders, his thumb rubbing gentle circles.

“I love you, Rhett. Like a brother and… more than that.”

“I love you too, Link.” It was as easy to say as it always had been.

Link hummed softly, sending subtle vibrations through Rhett’s cheek. At first the blond couldn’t make out the melody, but then he grinned broadly when he heard it resolve into the first notes of “their” song, the one they always sung together at karaoke bars, Diana Ross and Lionel Richie’s _Endless Love_. Link hummed through Lionel’s first lines and then began to sing softly at the point of Diana’s entrance, his clear tenor picking out the delicate notes:

_My first love,_  
 _You're every breath that I take_  
 _You're every step I make_

Rhett was ready when it came time for Lionel to join in, even though his voice had no power behind it and he couldn’t hold the notes nearly as long as he usually did. They hit the harmony of the duet portion of the song with practiced perfection:

_And I_  
 _I want to share_  
 _All my love with you_  
 _No one else will do..._

_And your eyes_  
 _Your eyes, your eyes_  
 _They tell me how much you care_  
 _Ooh yes, you will always be_  
 _My endless love_

As their voices faded into the part that would usually be filled with an instrumental bridge, Link said, “I love singing that with you.”

“It’s been a while, we should go out and do it again.”

“Definitely. Jen was telling me about this new place a few blocks from the studio, I forget the name…”

“We should check it out.”

It was obvious to Rhett they were seeking to distract themselves with small talk, but there was no room in their tiny space for the elephant that was looming. Link confronted it first. “It’ll be different now, though, won’t it? We always sang that song as kind of a joke, but when you actually listen to the words… it’s true.” The man’s arms tightened around him. “You’re my first love, Rhett. But not my only. What’re we gonna do about this?”

Rhett lay silent for a while, laboring to think through the growing fog in his head. The world felt like it was spinning slowly underneath him and he pressed his face into Link’s chest to try to calm the rising vertigo. Usually he was the one to think about their future and plan the best path forward, but he couldn’t seem to see it clearly right now.

“Rhett?”

“I’m sorry, Link. I don’t know.”

*

*

—Link—

He was surprised Rhett didn’t already some ideas about how to deal with this issue. The man loved to play with hypotheticals; he seemed to have a plan for every possible contingency in his life. Apparently the idea of him and Link being in love — real romantic love — was the one possibility he hadn’t let himself consider. Link didn’t blame him, of course, because he’d certainly avoided the topic as well. They’d both honed their denial over the course of three decades to where it had long since become second nature.

But after the kiss, denial was no longer an option. His lips still tingled with the foreign sensation of Rhett’s facial hair against them and his skin of his neck still felt warm where the other man had caressed it. Link spoke slowly, saying his thoughts aloud as he tried to tease his way through their complexities. “Well, we can’t… I mean, I love Christy, I could never leave—“

“I know,” Rhett interjected. “I wouldn’t want you to. I love Jessie just as much.”

Link tried to imagine explaining his feelings for Rhett to his wife. She was a patient woman who’d put up with a lot from him over the years, but this… this was worlds bigger than anything they’d gone through. He had no idea how she would react. She’d never been jealous of Rhett; she teased him about all the time he spent with his best friend and even joked Rhett was his “second wife,” but she’d always shared Link’s opinion that the two men were blessed to have each other. Sometimes he thought he saw a curious expression on her face when she watched the two of them interact, but she always waved his questions off.

“I’d have to tell her,” Link said quietly. “Unless you think it was just this one time. Like, just ‘cause we’re in this unique situation here.” He held his breath for Rhett’s answer.

“No.” A callused fingertip ran over Link’s lower lip. “Now that I know what it’s like to kiss you, I don’t think I could stop myself. It’s only gonna be better when I can use both hands.”

Link chuckled and kissed the pad of Rhett’s finger. His mind swung like a pendulum between happiness and worry and back again. “Me neither. So we need to convince them it’s okay, somehow. That we can love them and… and each other too.”

“Yeah.”

“How on earth do we do that?” What would happen to the life he’d so carefully built? In crossing this line with Rhett, had he just yanked out a foundation stone of his marriage? Was it only a matter of time before everything crumbled?

Rhett’s answer was not reassuring. “I dunno, Link.” He sounded very tired. His hand curled into the crook of the smaller man’s neck.

Link’s morbid sense of humor escaped his mouth before he could stop it. “If we never make it out of here, we won’t have to deal with it!” His forced chuckle faded when he realized Rhett wasn’t joining in.

“Don’t—“ Rhett coughed. “… say that,” he finished.

“Sorry.”

They lay without speaking for a few minutes accompanied by the sound of Rhett’s rasping breath. Link thought back to the kiss and remembered a detail he had been too distracted to mention at the time. “Is your mouth cut?”

“Huh?”

“Like, did you bite your tongue in the quake or something? You taste a little like blood.”

The man shifted on top of him before saying softly, “Yeah, I bit my cheek.”

“Oh, that must hurt.”

“A little.” Rhett’s voice was tight. “Sorry, it must taste gross.”

Link was quick to reassure him. “Honestly, I barely noticed. I was too excited.”

His friend’s fingers traced his cheekbone. “It’s nice to know I can excite you.”

Link laughed to hide his shiver. “You’ve always done that, trust me.” He raked his fingers lightly through the man’s hair, which had lost some of its styling-product stiffness by now. “You never noticed how I lose track of what I’m saying half the time we’re looking at each other?”

“I thought that was just you being flighty.”

“It really only happens with you, dude. Not to mention the goosebumps I get when you whisper in my ear.” Now that he’d admitted his feelings to himself, he could barely keep them from spilling out in a torrent of long-belated honesty. He suddenly felt as though he could fill a thousand pages with praise for the man he’d grown up beside.

Rhett’s hand stroked down his forearm. “Everything gives you goosebumps, silly.” His tone was dismissive, but Link could hear the smile in it.

“Oh, just take a compliment already. You drive me crazy.”

“Okay, if you say so.”

He leaned up to meet Rhett’s lips again, after a bit of maneuvering to find them. He nuzzled the man’s mustache, marveling at its softness. It should feel weird to him, he thought, but it didn’t. It felt amazing. They kissed gently for a little while until Rhett’s mouth left his and traveled along his jawline, brushing over the skin of his throat. Link was too tired and thirsty to want to escalate things further, but the sensations carried unspoken promises of future intimacies. _We have to find a way to make this work_ , he thought.

Fingers grasped the zipper of Link’s vest and pulled it partway down, then pushed the garment open so Rhett could lay his face against the smaller man’s cotton t-shirt, with fewer layers between himself and the smaller man’s warmth. Link put his arms around his friend’s shoulders and held him as he caressed his hair. He felt the man let out a long sigh. “We’re gonna get out of here,” Rhett mumbled. “We just have to… hold on…”

“Rhett?”

“M’okay. Just need to sleep some.”

Link stroked the side of the man’s face as he closed his own eyes. Maybe sleep wasn’t the worst idea; under normal circumstances it was his favorite hobby. He would have preferred to pass the time until their rescue with his lips locked on Rhett’s, but the position was awkward for Link and seemed worse for the other man. _More to look forward to once we get out,_ he consoled himself.

He listened to Rhett’s breathing slow down and even out. It was a rare thing for the larger man to fall asleep in Link’s presence before Link himself did; now that he thought about it, he probably hadn’t witnessed it in years. It made him feel protective. He wished he could see the strong lines of Rhett’s handsome face relaxed in sleep, but picturing it was enough to make him smile.

He lay still with his arms around Rhett’s shoulders until waves of exhaustion began to wash over him. They crashed against the pain in his head and made it hard for him to connect one thought to the next. His body began to feel heavy and cold, like a lead weight sinking into the ocean, with no concept anymore of time or location or space.

It wasn’t the normal sensation of falling asleep, where his mind went comfortably blank and he slipped away into an easy rest. Instead, Link found himself fighting against it, not wanting to descend into the depths he was being pulled into. He struggled toward the surface but had no light to tell him whether he was going up or further down. He was lost.

He was dimly aware that he needed to do something, that there was something he should be worried about, but every piece of reality he tried to grasp became insubstantial and slipped through his fingers. Something was wrong. The agony in his head roared loudly enough to drive out all thought, all sense of self. He labored in vain to push a word past numb lips — the only word he could think of, the only word that had any meaning for him anymore — _Rhett_ … but it wouldn’t come.

His hand fell from his friend’s back and lay open on the floor. 


	6. Chapter 6

—Rhett—

When he opened his eyes, the first thing he noticed was that he could actually see something for the first time in what felt like weeks. It wasn’t much, just the faint grey outlines of shapes in front of his face, but he could at least tell the difference between his eyes being open and shut, which was a major improvement. He had no way of knowing whether the tiny amount of illumination was natural or artificial, but as his eager eyes drank it in, somehow he had the impression that it was sunlight. That meant that somewhere above them was an opening into the world. It also meant that they’d gone the entire night without rescue and now it was morning. 

He lifted his head and let out a whimper as the pain that had been lurking just beneath the surface pounced and sank in its talons. He took a few slow breaths through his nose and out, forcing himself to relax a jaw that was sore from being clenched in his sleep. His dry tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth and his eyelids were scratchy with salt. He was achingly thirsty and so, so cold.

He blinked and rubbed at his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, straining to focus them. The mountains and valleys in front of his nose slowly resolved themselves into the silhouette of his friend’s face. He deciphered the roundness of his cheeks and the angle of his chin; his closed eyes and softly parted lips. “Link,” he whispered.

The man didn’t stir, and Rhett smirked at the lack of response. Trust his friend to be a heavy sleeper even under the most extreme of circumstances. “C’mon sleeping beauty, time to wake up.” He clasped the man’s shoulder and shook it gently. 

He waited, but there was still no sound from the shadows. Icy tendrils of dread began to creep into Rhett’s chest as he ran his fingers down Link’s arm to where the man’s hand lay outstretched. He squeezed it as he repeated Link’s name, and squeezed it harder as he said it a third time. It remained limp and cool in his grasp.

“No, no…” He yanked his arm back up, gasping as he wrenched his back in his haste. He groped for the bend in Link’s neck where his pulse should be, but his fingers felt thick and numb, and it was hard to tell if he was even in the right place, let alone if he’d be able to feel a faint beat of life. 

He pressed his ear to the man’s chest. A rushing, irregular sound filled Rhett’s head that he at first thought to be Link’s heartbeat, but then he realized it was surging in time with the shuddering in his own body. His heart tripped and fluttered in his panic, laboring as he gasped for air. He couldn’t quell his own breathing enough to hear the sound he so desperately sought. 

He fumbled for Link’s face and held his hand trembling above the man’s mouth and nose. Was that the soft caress of breath against his skin, or was it merely the breeze from above? Rhett choked out Link’s name in a sob of frustration and terror. Pinned as he was, he didn’t have many options. He didn’t have the leverage to do CPR, let alone manage it with one hand. He couldn’t reach the man’s mouth with his own in order to breathe into it without hauling Link half upright, and even then he wouldn’t be able to make a good seal.  
 _Please God,_ he prayed. _Take me instead of him. I can’t live without him._

He braced his hand on the ground and tried to lift himself off of the other man, slamming his shoulders against the table above them with a snarl of desperation. What did it matter if he brought the rest of the house down on them now? He had to get them out. He had to find help. Why had he waited this long, trusting that others would come for them? He hadn’t known Link was in such bad shape. He’d thought he only had himself to worry about. 

_I told him we’d be okay._

Panic made him heedless of the splintering feeling that shot through his chest as he writhed, clawing at the floor to drag himself forward, jerking his upper body violently against the debris that pinned it down. He coughed and felt liquid spray from his mouth before it filled immediately again with blood. He spat it out and shouted Link’s name again and again. 

His flailing hand found something solid to his right, a piece of furniture or broken flooring, and he grabbed ahold of it. He used it to pull himself forward with all of his strength until finally he felt a shift in the weight on his back, barely anything, but enough to move his lower body a few inches from where it had lain since the house had come down. As he did so, a terrible tearing sensation surged in to fill the vacant space of numbness below his waist and he screamed in shock and pain.

Even though he immediately stopped moving, the white-hot agony in his legs told him the damage was already done. He could not even draw breath to scream again; there seemed to be no room in his lungs for air. He couldn’t get his hand down to feel the source of his injury; the space was still too confined to reach. 

He suddenly felt weak, as if his strength were draining out of him with each tortured beat of his heart, and he collapsed onto arms no longer able to bear his weight. The stabbing pain was overtaken by a new kind of numbness that brought no relief as it cradled him in its icy embrace. It dragged his eyelids closed and blanketed over his panic with a helpless immobility. He laid his cheek back down on Link’s chest and curled his hand around the man’s shoulder, lips straining to form his friend’s name. The muscles in his back twitched as his nerves fired randomly, sparks of his body’s futile attempt to save itself.

He had only one thought before he slipped into the abyss.

 _Link._

*

*

—Link—

He was slow to remember where he was when he woke. His head hurt so badly he could barely breathe, and the rest of his body wasn’t far behind. He remembered how he had fallen asleep, painfully and helplessly, into something more like unconsciousness than rest. He thought he might have a pretty bad concussion. But why did he wake up just now? He had dim memories of a kind of commotion… 

He became aware of a new sensation: a warm wetness on his thighs. “Eugh, dude!” he exclaimed as he opened his eyes. “Did you wet the bed?”

He saw the top of Rhett’s head in the faint grey light and smiled despite his discomfort. In any other situation he’d be horribly grossed out, but given the circumstances he hardly cared. What did one more indignity matter after all they’d been through? It was even less significant in light of their romantic confessions, and Link smiled and stroked Rhett’s cheek as he reminisced about the kisses. The smile evaporated as a distinctive scent washed over him, sending him tumbling back across the years to a sunny cow pasture at the edge of a golf course.

_The tall boy tore out the two sheets of notebook paper and placed them reverently on the grass in front of where they knelt. The warm breeze stirred the papers and tugged at their clothing. He looked at Link with wide eyes the color of a storm at sea. “Ready?”_

_“Ready.”_

_Nothing had ever felt as important as what they were about to do. He watched Rhett drag the piece of broken glass across his palm, then took it from him and did the same to himself before he could chicken out. In unison they collected the thin beads of blood on their index fingers and wrote their names at the bottom of one sheet of paper, then swapped and did the same. When they were done, they turned and faced each other._

_“That’s it, then,” Link said._

_The other boy nodded. “There’s no turning back.”_

_They stood and Rhett opened his arms and Link moved into them, pressing his face into the other teenager’s chest. His new blood brother wrapped his arms around Link’s shoulders with his palm turned up toward the sun behind the smaller boy’s head, keeping the small wound clear of their shirts. The wind carried the coppery scent of it into Link’s lungs along with the essence of the oath it had sealed, and he savored it like the breath of life itself._

_Rhett’s blood, rich with love and strength and infinite potential._

“Rhett?” Link’s voice quavered. He pressed his fingertips to the man’s forehead and felt skin that was damp and cold. He let out a moan of fear and shook the man’s shoulders. “Rhett?”

There was a long moment in which his heart seemed frozen in his chest, then he heard the faintest rasp of air come from the larger man’s mouth. Link waited motionless until he heard the noise again. His friend was breathing, but not by much. Tears of relief sprang to his eyes as he shifted around, groping for information as to what the problem was. 

Evidently Rhett had managed to move a few inches forward and Link could reach more of him now, especially if he twisted and stretched. Eventually his hand encountered a rough metal rod protruding from the back of the man’s thigh, surrounded by torn jeans that were soaked with sticky, warm liquid. The piece of rebar had pierced through the table and entered Rhett’s leg but hadn’t exited the other side, and its presence must have plugged the wound and kept it from bleeding until it had shifted for some reason. 

Fear wiped Link’s mind clean for a moment before he pulled himself back together. _Okay. Okay. Gotta do something about this._

He shifted further out from under the other man, careful not to jostle his lower body, and unzipped his vest the rest of the way. He contorted himself until he was able to wrestle it off of his shoulders and pulled it free from underneath his back, then shoved it down around the wound. He used all his strength to pack the padded nylon into it to staunch the bleeding. As he did so, the larger man stirred and moaned sharply.

“Shhh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Link babbled. He held the vest in place with one hand and clutched the man’s head to his chest with the other, stroking his hair back from the clammy skin of his forehead. “It’s gonna be okay. I got you.” He pressed his lips into Rhett’s hair. “I love you, Rhett. I love you so much.”

The man was clearly delirious; he tossed his head away from Link’s touch with a soft whimper. It was clear the more pressure Link put on the wound the more it hurt, and the larger man tried to move away from the pain without the understanding that he was still pinned in place. Link held him tightly and continued to murmur apologies; it cut him to the core to know he was causing the man such agony. _Please God,_ he prayed. _If you have to take someone, take me. Let him live._

Eventually Link’s voice seemed to get through to Rhett, or else exhaustion overtook him, because his aimless movements began to slow. His muscles grew slack in Link’s arms and his breath rasped shallowly through his blood-spattered lips. Link pressed his face into the man’s hair and trembled as his immediate panic subsided.  

Even though his head still felt heavy and pain lanced through it relentlessly, there was no question of sleeping anymore. Link was determined to stay awake and keep vigil over his friend for as long as it took until they were saved. He began to hum softly, casting about for tunes that would sooth the other man, recalling the country ballads of their youth. He watched the sunlight slowly filled the space that held them. 

“It’s daytime, Rhett,” he whispered. “They’ll find us soon. Just hold on a little longer.”


	7. Chapter 7

—Rhett—

There was a paralyzing, grinding pain in his chest and his leg was on fire. He struggled to open his eyes against eyelids that felt like they were glued shut. He parted his lips to moan and choked on something hard in his throat. He tried to raise his arms to defend himself from the agonizing assault but they merely twitched at his sides. Then he heard voices, soothing voices, and felt a cool hand on his forehead. Someone shouted in the distance and rapid footsteps approached. There was a single click and then the pain receded, and with it went Rhett’s consciousness.

This might have happened multiple times, but eventually he woke up and discovered his pain to be much less. It lingered at the edge of his psyche, held at bay by a cottony blanket of numbness, and he found he was able to think and breathe again. He remembered who he was and began to piece together what had happened. He swallowed and licked lips that were dry and cracked. He took a deep breath and slowly opened his eyes.

He was lying face-up in a narrow bed whose back was raised slightly up. Above him were speckled ceiling tiles and recessed lighting. He cautiously rotated his head to his right to take in the monitors with their silently flashing lights, and to the left to see the polished chrome IV stand and the bags of clear liquid that hung from it. He followed the tubes that ran out of the latter down to his hand, which was being held between two smaller hands. He carefully lifted his head to bring their brown-haired owner into sight: Jessie.

She was watching him intently and her face broke into a soft smile when their eyes met. “Hi, baby,” she said. “It’s good to see you.”

Rhett’s lips twitched into a weak smile at the soothing comfort of her presence. It felt like years since he had seen her face. Before he could enjoy it, though, he fought through the narcotic fog to get his lips to form a word. “Link?”

She gestured with her head. “Right over there.”

Rhett looked to find Link sprawled in a chair on the other side of the bed, long legs straight out and head tilted back, hands clasped together on his lap and mouth slightly open in sleep. He had no visible injuries. “Thank God,” Rhett murmured.

“He asked me to wake him if you woke up again.” Jessie squeezed his hand before releasing it and standing to walk over to the chair. She put her hand on Link’s shoulder and he opened his eyes and looked up at her groggily. “He’s asking for you,” she said.

Link turned to Rhett with a huge grin of relief. “Hey, brother!” He leaned forward and grasped Rhett’s hand tightly, and Rhett noticed he was wearing his backup pair of glasses with the black rims. “Nice of you to join us in the land of the conscious.”

He stared at Link, drinking in the sight of the man’s sparkling blue eyes. Seeing his best friend alive and whole made his pain recede further. It seemed like a miracle. “How long have I been out?”

“Four days. They had to patch a lot of you up. You really did a number on that leg. And your ribs. And… basically everything else.”

That seemed to be accurately reflected in the pain Rhett’s body was reporting to him. “Anything permanent?” he rasped.

“It doesn’t look like it, but you’ll need a lot of rehab. Your back took quite a beating and we know it wasn’t great to begin with.”

Rhett tried flexing his feet and sighed with relief when he saw movement under the covers at the end of the bed. He took a slow breath, stopping when he felt the pain in his ribs, but relieved that he seemed able to get enough air on his own despite that restriction. More memories began to edge their way back into his mind, of Link’s unresponsive body, of being trapped and helpless in the dark. “I thought you were dying,” he murmured, his throat tightening. “I had to do something.”

Link reached out his free hand and cupped Rhett’s cheek, his warm fingers settling into the blond beard. “It’s okay. I had a bad concussion, but it’s okay now. We’re both okay now.”

Rhett closed his eyes and turned his face toward Link’s palm with a sigh. They were quiet for a few seconds until both men flinched at the sound of Jessie clearing her throat. Link withdrew his hand as Rhett looked up to see her looking down at them from the other side of the bed, her expression unreadable for a moment before she smiled. “I’m going to go get a coffee and let you fellas catch up.” She leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on Rhett’s forehead. “Back in a bit.”

Rhett watched her go, then turned back to Link. The smaller man gave him a brief account of their rescue by an emergency crew who found them a few hours after Rhett had passed out. Link had heard people nearby and shouted to get their attention, and it didn’t take long for the two men to be carefully extracted and rushed to the hospital.

Rhett listened in fascination, having no memory of it himself. Eventually Link wrapped up the story and answered all of his friend’s questions, then looked down to where his hand held Rhett’s. His brow furrowed and he chewed his lip. Eventually he said, “I have to tell you something.”

“Uh oh. Am I worse off than I thought?”

“No! Nothing like that.” Link faced him with wide, worried eyes. “It’s just, I…” He raked his free hand through his hair. “I told Jessie what happened. With us.”

Rhett felt a rush of cold as the blood drained from his face. “You… what?”

“I’m sorry, Rhett. We were both here last night with you and it was really late… you know how I get when I’m overtired, I lose what little filters I have…” Link’s voice started to crack and he looked back down at the bedsheets as the words rushed out of him. “I made an offhand comment about us, y’know, being closer now than ever, and she asked me about it and I just thought, with you like this and we didn’t even know if you were gonna wake up, it didn’t seem right to have any secrets between our families… but I know it wasn’t my place to tell her and I’m so sorry about that, I really am…”

Rhett took a steadying breath. “Well…?” Link looked up at him with bloodshot eyes. “What did she say?”

The corner of Link’s mouth twitched up in a smile. “She said she wasn’t all that surprised.”

Rhett let out a breathless laugh. “Really?”

“Yeah, she let me explain the whole thing, how we’re both still committed to our families, that we don’t want this to change anything… I don’t know how much she really believed but she didn’t yell or kick me out or anything.”

“Wow…” It was too much to process right after waking up to the fact that he wasn’t still trapped and fighting for his life, to think that he’d also be fighting for his family and for Link now too. But at the same time, the euphoria of surviving such a close brush with death made him feel like he could handle anything, even this.

He shook his head. “Well, thanks for saving me the awkwardness of breaking the news myself, I guess.”

Link smiled and ducked his head, clearly relieved. “You’re not mad?”

“That you can’t keep your mouth shut? Should I be surprised?”

The brunet stuck out his tongue, then leaned down and rested his head on his friend’s chest with a soft giggle. Rhett stroked his hair. “What about Christy?”

“I told her too. She freaked out at first but I told her Jessie was cool with it and that helped.”

Rhett chuckled in disbelief. “That’s amazing.”

“Yeah. We’re really blessed, man. I mean, we’ve got a long road ahead of us if we’re gonna make this work, but least the door’s open now.”

He squeezed Link’s hand. “I guess that’s the first step then.”

The other man sat up and grinned at him. “It’s the second step. Kissing you was the first step.”

Rhett gazed into his friend’s beautiful blue eyes. “Oh? Are you sure we got that one right?”

Link leaned forward and traced his fingertips down Rhett’s check, careful to avoid the superficial scrapes and bruises. “Better safe than sorry,” he whispered, and then they kissed for the first time in the light of day, repeating all the confessions and promises they had made to each other in the dark.

*

*

—Link—

He pulled into Rhett’s driveway and parked the car. In the past he would have simply honked and waited for his friend to come out of the house, but today was special, because it was Rhett’s first day back to the studio after three months of rehabilitation. It had been a long and painful journey for the man, but he had finally regained enough mobility that he felt comfortable going back to work.

After a few weeks off for his own recovery, Link had started filming GMM again. He didn’t want the channel to lose its momentum and he knew Rhett would have some major hospital bills to pay, so he did the best he could. Fortunately, other YouTubers were happy to help co-host, especially once word got out in the community of what had happened. Being in front of the camera without Rhett was like trying to pilot the two-headed monster costume by himself, but he made it through by remembering it was only temporary.

In his first video back he explained to the Mythical Beasts what had happened in general terms, but saved the detailed story for when Rhett had returned and they could tell it together. The studio’s P.O. box was soon overflowing with get-well wishes for the bearded half of the duo and thoughtful gifts for Link to help him weather his friend’s absence.

He knew the viewers would be happy to see the big man back in the studio, but no one could be as excited as Link himself. He knocked on Rhett’s door and it opened to reveal the blond man in a striped sweater and loose-fitting jeans. His hair and beard were neatly trimmed and he beamed down at Link with a hearty, “Good morning!”

Link leaned up on his toes and put his arms around the man’s shoulders as they met in a lingering kiss. “Mm, good morning,” he replied. “Ready?”

“Absolutely.”

Link exchanged a wave with Jessie, who smiled at him from the kitchen, then turned and led the way back to his car. The four of them — Link, Rhett, Jessie, and Christy — had had many long talks over the past three months about how the new arrangement was going to work, and they were still muddling their way through. As usual with any new topic in their lives, Rhett had taken the lead this time too, researching open marriages and educating them all on recommended approaches and pitfalls to avoid.

It was hard, very hard, to talk openly about such personal issues as security and jealousy, commitment and desire. All four of them struggled with the concept of restructuring their relationships in such a fundamental way. At times it seemed overwhelming, or even impossible, but then Link would see Rhett’s smile or hear Christy’s laugh and know that their happiness was worth fighting for.

They took things slowly, with the understanding that the stability of their families was paramount. For now the women had decided they were comfortable enough with the men cuddling and sharing kisses; if that went on for a while without the world ending, they were willing to talk about more.

As much as he wanted more, Link was okay with waiting as long as necessary for their wives’ blessing. He was just happy to finally be able express his deep feelings for his best friend in a way he’d never done before, and to hear them echoed back to him. The fact that they could make out like teenagers and tease each other mercilessly without the pressure of escalation was an entertaining side effect. There was so much to look forward to and they had their whole lives to explore it. He was confident they’d be able to show their wives that there was more than enough love to go around.

They held hands atop Rhett’s thigh during the drive to work, and when they arrived they discovered the crew had set up a small celebration. A few weeks ago Link had carefully broken the news to them that he and Rhett were exploring something romantic together, emphasizing that they had their wives’ consent. He’d been relieved and gratified when the crew members had expressed nothing but support (and a little bit of “It’s about time!”). This meant there was nothing but gentle teasing when the two men stayed shared a quick hug or kiss.

Rhett insisted they save the cake until it was time to film, then proceeded to consume at least a quarter of it over the course of the video where they told the story of their ordeal. “It’s important to show the audience I’ve got a healthy appetite,” he’d insisted, and Link could only laugh and agree.

A week after the rescue team had dug him and Rhett out, Link had returned to the wreckage with the crew to search for the camera. Jen eventually found it a few yards from the broken table with its screen smashed but the memory card still intact. In GMM, they showed the footage they’d recorded during the mad dash through the shaking building and talked about the earthquake itself. It had done significant damage to L.A.; the entire region had suffered damaged roads and knocked out cellphone towers, which was why it had taken so long for the men to be rescued.

In Good Mythical More they got into more detail about their personal injuries and Rhett’s rehabilitation. Eventually the conversation wrapped up and Eddie turned off the camera. The men thanked the crew for a successful video and they all sat around chatting and eating cake for a while longer. The main topic of conversation, naturally, was everyone’s individual experiences with the earthquake.

Link fell quiet as he watched Rhett talking cheerfully with the crew, relieved to see the man getting back into the swing of things as if he’d never left. The two men occasionally exchanged warm glances over everyone’s heads until Link got tired of being at arms’ distance and slid his chair closer, and Rhett put his arm around the smaller man’s shoulders and squeezed.

Link held the hand that was draped over his collarbone, caressing his friend’s wrist with his thumb. When there was a natural lull in the conversation, he spoke quietly. “You know, Rhett, I always imagined being caught in an earthquake like the ground opens up these great big cracks—“

“Like in a cartoon?”

“Yeah, just like that. One opens up between my legs and I only have a split second to decide which side to stand on. I always used to worry I’d pick wrong. But this time… I thought I had to choose between you and my family. I thought I was gonna be ripped in half if I didn’t go one way or the other. But instead we somehow made a bridge across together.”

Rhett smiled thoughtfully. “Yeah, we did.”

“I mean, yeah, we almost died and you had to spend months in rehab and you’re gonna have some funky scars. But aside from all that…” he reached out and took Rhett’s hand. “I’m grateful for the fact that it woke us up. It forced us to confront what I was too scared to see. I love you, Rhett.”

“I love you too, Link.”

The blond man leaned down with a smile, and Link reached up and cupped his cheek. Their lips met in a tender kiss as the crew clapped and laughed at their sentimentality. When it became clear the two men had no plans to stop anytime soon, everyone began to filter out and leave them to their privacy.

Eventually Link broke away and leaned back to grin up at his best friend. “We should probably make a video explaining the new arrangement.”

“Yeah, I think that’s a good idea.”

“That’s gonna be my favorite video yet.”

Rhett pulled him into a tight hug. “Mine too.”

*

*

—End of World Falls Away—


End file.
